Former BB&T executive gets 27 months in jail

Tracy Brown

The former city executive for BB&T Bank in Chattanooga was sentenced Monday to more than two years in prison for making fraudulent loans and forging customer signatures.

Tracy Brown, the head of commercial lending for BB&T in Chattanooga until he was dismissed last fall, pleaded guilty to federal bank fraud charges in May after admitting he tried to bilk the bank and three of its customers out of $475,000 in fraudulent loans. Brown put the loans in clients' names and then withdrew the money for personal use in his and his wife's accounts, according to court documents.

Brown called one of the customers and told him there had been a mistake in his name and it would soon be corrected. The customer reported that his name appeared to have been forged on at least two of the loans.

BB&T spokesman Brian Davis said no client accounts or funds were compromised in the end and Brown was dismissed from the bank.

Brown could have faced a maximum penalty of 30 years in jail and a $1 million fine. U.S. District Court Judge Sandy Mattice sentenced Brown Monday to 27 months in jail and ordered him to pay $34230,361 in restitution to the bank. Brown also will be on a supervised probation for four years.